TARGET Instant Payment Settlement

TIPSACTIVE

Operator: Eurosystem (Banca d'Italia lead development)

Overseer: European Central Bank (ECB)

Legal basis: ECB Guideline on TARGET (ECB/2022/8)

Launched: Nov 30, 2018

EUR 5,175,284, SEK 3,042,190, DKK 1,634,880; total 9,852,354

Daily Volume

Sep 30, 2026 · European Central Bank

EUR €7.3bn, SEK 2.0bn SEK, DKK 1.6bn DKK

Daily Value

Sep 30, 2026 · European Central Bank

16,293 user BICs covering 3,627 distinct financial institution names (EUR)

Participants

Nov 2, 2026 · ECB list of TIPS direct participants and reachable parties – EUR

Yearly Growth

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Executive Summary

Iceland's Seðlabanki Íslands signed agreement with ECB on June 24, 2026, for ISK to join TIPS in 2028, becoming the fifth settlement currency (after EUR, SEK, DKK, and NOK)

How It Works

Settlement Model

Real-Time Gross Settlement (individual transaction settlement)

Message Standard

ISO 20022 — pacs.008 (routed from CSMs or direct participants)

Max Transaction

€999,999,999.99 at scheme level (EPC 2025 SCT Inst Rulebook v1.0, effective 5 October 2025). The ECB TIPS facts page states no upper limit at platform level.

Clearing Mechanism

Direct settlement — TIPS is itself the settlement mechanism. No separate clearing layer.

Settlement Cycle

Continuous 24/7/365 — no batch windows, no cut-off times

Message Flow

An instant payment instruction arrives at TIPS either directly from a participant or via a CSM (RT1, STEP2-T, or national systems). TIPS checks the sender's Dedicated Cash Account (DCA) for sufficient funds. If available, the sender's DCA is debited and the receiver's DCA is credited simultaneously with immediate finality. The entire process targets under 10 seconds end-to-end. Liquidity is managed by transferring funds between the DCA and the participant's Main Cash Account in T2.

Typical Use Cases

Settlement of SEPA Instant Credit Transfers, multi-currency instant settlement (EUR, SEK, DKK), future cross-border instant payment corridors

Key Data

Daily Volume

EUR 5,175,284, SEK 3,042,190, DKK 1,634,880; total 9,852,354

As of Sep 30, 2026 · European Central Bank

Daily Value

EUR €7.3bn, SEK 2.0bn SEK, DKK 1.6bn DKK

As of Sep 30, 2026 · European Central Bank

Participants

16,293 user BICs covering 3,627 distinct financial institution names (EUR)

As of Nov 2, 2026 · ECB list of TIPS direct participants and reachable parties – EUR

Yearly Growth

As of ·

Participants & Access

Membership Requirements

Credit institutions with Eurosystem counterparty status. Also accessible via instructing parties (CSMs like RT1, STEP2-T). Non-euro NCBs may join for their domestic currency.

Governance & Risk

Governance Model

Part of the TARGET platform, governed by ECB Guideline. Banca d'Italia led initial development. Multi-currency governance involves non-euro NCBs (Riksbank for SEK, Danmarks Nationalbank for DKK).

Concentration Risk

TIPS is becoming the dominant instant settlement infrastructure as the ECB promotes central bank money settlement. However, RT1 and STEP2-T provide CSM-level alternatives for clearing, maintaining some competition.

Resilience & Business Continuity

Eurosystem infrastructure with dual-site architecture. 24/7 operations centre. The ECB TIPS facts page reports that 99.99% of payments are processed in TIPS in less than five seconds; it publishes no platform availability target. Fallback to standard SCT if instant path fails.

Dispute Resolution

TARGET compensation scheme applies. Operational disputes follow ECB procedures.

Pricing

TIPS operates under full cost recovery. Domestic settlement is charged per transaction and split across the actors involved, with monthly fees per account. Cross-border services carry no dedicated monthly fee and rely on a fee per transaction only, split equally across the involved TIPS actors, with dedicated Eurosystem investment in cross-border services recovered separately from domestic use so that domestic-only participants are not burdened. The Eurosystem charges only TIPS-EUR participants, and fees for participants of counterparty platforms are not determined by the Eurosystem. The cross-border pricing policy enters into force as of the next TARGET Guideline update in June 2027, and a Holiday Fee applies during the first six months of operations of each interlinking corridor. Pricing levels were set to let the service meet the G20 objective of capping remittance payment costs at 3%.

Transaction fee: Domestic settlement €0.002 per transaction (€0.001 originator PSP, €0.001 beneficiary PSP); internal ACH settlement degressive €0.0004 to €0.00015. Cross-border from June 2027, EUR outgoing: interlinking €0.30 originator PSP plus €0.30 exit-leg PSP; OCT Inst €0.30 originator PSP plus €0.30 exit-leg PSP; cross-currency €0.001 for each of originator, exit-leg, entry-leg and beneficiary PSP; recalls and Inquiry Fee Payment Orders €0.002 split equally.

Participation fee: Monthly: €800 per TIPS DCA, €3,000 per TIPS ASTA, €20 per reachable Authorised Account User (one free for PSPs, capped at 50). No entry fee and no information services fee. No dedicated monthly fee for TIPS cross-border services.

Source: European Central Bank

Connectivity

settles

SEPA Inst

TIPS settles SCT Inst transactions in central bank money

liquidity from

T2 / TARGET

Dedicated Cash Accounts funded from T2 Main Cash Accounts

interlinks with

RT1

RT1 routes transactions to TIPS for central bank money settlement

settles

RIX-INST

TIPS settles Swedish instant payments (SEK) via RIX-INST

Peer Comparison

TIPS is unique as a multi-currency instant settlement system in central bank money. FedNow settles in Fed funds (central bank money) but is USD-only. UK Faster Payments settles in commercial bank money via prefunding. TIPS's €0.002 per-transaction pricing significantly undercuts private CSMs.

FedNow

FPS · United States · Federal Reserve

Faster Payments

FPS · United Kingdom · Pay.UK

Compare in detail →

Regulatory Framework

indicative dateDec 31, 2026

Digital euro preparation phase

ECB preparation phase for digital euro with concrete pilot timeline disclosed March 2026. Regulation proposed June 2023; Council mandate adopted December 19, 2025; European Parliament negotiating position adopted July 9, 2026; trilogues under way since July 13, 2026, with the Irish Council Presidency scheduling further political trilogues for September 10 and September 30, 2026, and political agreement targeted before end-2026. Pilot launch planned H2 2027 on TIPS infrastructure, with potential first issuance by 2029. The Eurosystem launched Pontes, which settles wholesale transactions in tokenised assets in central bank money, on 21 September 2026. On 28 September 2026 the Eurosystem opened a call for a new wave of digital euro innovation platform activities: applications by 9 November 2026, experimentation from January to June 2027.

DelayedDec 31, 2026

SWIFT CBPR+ structured address mandate

SWIFT mandates structured postal addresses in all CBPR+ ISO 20022 messages. Unstructured address fields will no longer be accepted for cross-border payments. Financial institutions must ensure all counterparty address data is structured. Industry reports suggest ~44% of banks are behind schedule for Nov 2026 deadlines.

Timeline

Stored date Nov 20, 2027; precision not reviewed

TIPS maintenance: TIPS R2027.NOV release live in production maintenance window recorded

TIPS R2027.NOV release live in production — 2027-11-20 (informational). Recorded by ClearingPost on 2026-11-12.